Crime

Jack the Ripper’s identity ‘cracked’: famed crime writer Patricia Cornwell

After 11 years of research, Cornwell believes ‘now more than ever’ that the legendary mass
murderer was Victorian artist Walter Sickert — who shared the same doctor as the British royal
family. Saturday, November 30, 2013, 2:15 PM

Patricia Cornwell even bought a desk belonging to Sickert to check for DNA. Steven
Senne/ASSOCIATED PRESS Patricia Cornwell even bought a desk belonging to Sickert to check for
DNA.

U.S crime writer Patricia Cornwell is ready to end a 125-year-old mystery and finally reveal the
identity of possibly the world's most famous serial killer, Jack the Ripper.

After 11 years of painstaking research and spending millions of her own dollars, Cornwell is set to
claim the man responsible for the grisly murder of at least five prostitutes in Victorian London was
artist Walter Sickert.

"I feel that I have cracked it," she told London's Evening Standard newspaper. "I believe it's Sickert,
and I believe it now more than ever."

Author Patricia Cornwell holds a knife at her home in Greenwich, Conn., Nov. 14, 2002 — when she
first claimed that Walter Sickert was Jack The Ripper.

The author has been working with a Scotland Yard detective to try and finally solve the puzzle which
has fascinated "Ripperologists" since 1888.

Using records held in archives in the British capital, Cornwell says "confessional and violent" letters
sent at the time to police by the killer, match paper used by Sickert.

Walter Richard Sickert, around 1912, was a German-born British artist and painter who studied under
Whistler and was influenced by Degas. George C. Beresford/Getty Images Walter Richard Sickert,
around 1912, was a German-born British artist and painter who studied under Whistler and was
influenced by Degas.

Cornwell even bought a desk belonging to Sickert to test for DNA. And her book, to be published next
year, will contain "evidence" of a royal family conspiracy, reported the Evening Standard.

Sickert shared the same physician as the British royal family, claims Cornwell.

Sickert was himself fascinated so much by the crimes that he painted a room of a bedroom used by
Jack the Ripper. However, he was never considered a suspect at the time.

Cornwell, who has sold over 100 million books, first claimed in 2002 that Sickert was Jack the Ripper.